We’re in the middle of an exciting construction project… building a walk-in freezer! This will allow us to store our pasture-raised products in a central location (by the way, phase two is a little on-farm store!), and will enable Matt to stand upright inside while he’s moving things around! Most freezers are only 6 feet tall inside, so our 6-foot-five farm brainiac has to stoop down while he’s organizing. This freezer will be 8′ inside. He’s happy about that.
Check out the pictures of our progress so far!
Our family was privileged to attend this year’s American Pastured Poultry Producer’s Association Conference in Dallas. It was three days of wonderful networking and sharpening of farming minds. If you’re a farmer type, we highly recommend attending. If you’re a beginner, it’s an ocean of information to drink in as fast as you can. If you’re a middle-experience farmer, it’s an opportunity to gain the knowledge you need
I rendered lard for the first time last weekend, using pork fat from Shady Grove Ranch. It was an easy and fun project, yielding 8 nice “bricks” of lard which I wrapped and stored in my freezer. Plus, we got some delicious “cracklin’s” for snacks and to use in cornbread. Today, I made the best chocolate pie from scratch, using my rendered lard in the pie crust and my cowshare milk as the base of the chocolate filling. If I had entered that pie in a bake-off, it would have won first prize without a doubt. Thanks for the information I learned at your cooking class. Even though I’m an experienced cook, I learned a lot! The class was well worth the afternoon of time spent in your kitchen.
I was curious if this is a design of your own, or you found plans, or a kit, or? ironically, I was just talking to my brother about how we need a walk-in of our very own, lol. I guess the questions of how much insulation where and size of the unit vs size of the room etc would seem to be the most important things to get right. Is there any tips you could give on the design? Thanks for a great job with a photo walk through.